


Cogs in a Machine

by writewithurheart



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: F/M, Steampunk AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-07
Updated: 2016-02-07
Packaged: 2018-05-18 21:29:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,791
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5943736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writewithurheart/pseuds/writewithurheart
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Olicity Steampunk AU </p><p>“I thought I told you not to touch anything.”</p><p>The words are a caustic growl from behind him. Oliver slowly releases the unknown gadget and places it gently on the grease-smeared work table. Who knows what might happen if he accidentally activates it.</p><p>“I’ve told you – repeatedly – that activating the wrong thing could blow up this entire block! Honestly! Is it that hard to understand? There’s more explosive power in this room than in the whole city combined. A block is probably too small an estimate. This is why I wanted my lab far from civilization in some remote property, but nooooo. Mr. Queen just had to have his tech nearby.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cogs in a Machine

**Author's Note:**

> The idea popped into my head and pretty much just wrote itself today. I hope you enjoy it.

**Cogs in a Machine**

An Olicity Steampunk AU

...

“I thought I told you not to touch anything.”

The words are a caustic growl from behind him. Oliver slowly releases the unknown gadget and places it gently on the grease-smeared work table. Who knows what might happen if he accidentally activates it.

“I’ve told you – _repeatedly_ – that activating the wrong thing could blow up this entire block! Honestly! Is it that hard to understand? There’s more explosive power in this room than in the whole city combined. A block is probably too small an estimate. This is why I wanted my lab far from civilization in some remote property, but _nooooo_. Mr. Queen just _had_ to have his tech nearby.”

He grins at her teasing words as she maneuvers the tight space of her work area with deft control of her wheelchair that he would not have expected of her in the days following her accident. Not to say Felicity wasn’t a strong woman, but pushing all your body weight around – even for someone as small as herself – was exhausting.

Oliver had expected her to fashion herself a mechanical wheelchair that responded to controls or her voice. But she had waved him off, saying she didn’t have the time for such frivolous, self-indulgent fancies when they had a city to save.

“And then he refuses to listen to reason,” she bats his hand away from another gadget on her desk, “and continues to play with dangerous machines. How many times have I told you! My lab is not full of toys for you to play with!”

“It kind of is,” he grins back, gesturing towards the green suit set up in the back corner.

Felicity huffs in his general direction and goes back to assembling her latest invention. “Well, you still need to be more careful. If you had pressed this button, it would have knocked you out. Then I would have had to deal with all that,” she waves at all of him, “on the floor, in the middle of my workshop. And I would get nothing done because I couldn’t roll around you.”

She brushes her hair back from her eyes and pushes her glasses up, leaving a streak of black grease on her forehead and cheek.

What she doesn’t realize is that he’s staring at her in complete fascination as she moves on to other gizmos that are far more familiar to him: radios, trick arrows, Digg’s armor. Oliver couldn’t move his feet from the spot if he wanted to. Her babbling soothes him and envelops him in a warmth that he’s come to associate with her and _home_. 

Perversely, it was the accident that forced him to acknowledge what had been creeping up on him for the last four years: He was in love with Felicity Smoak.

There were plenty of clues along the way, as their partner John Diggle was eager to point out. For one, the only person who could get Oliver to change his mind on something was Felicity. While anyone else might make headway, Felicity could easily bend him to her will, which he hadn’t noticed until John flat out told him: “If you don’t do this, I’ll just get Felicity to ask.” Now he noticed it all the time.

Then there were the stolen touches. Oliver was never a fan of physical affection displayed in constant touching. Yet with Felicity, he found excuses to be near her, reasons to keep them in the same space. He sought her out when he needed someone to ground him. And when she was in turmoil he stuck by her side.

And, of course, there was his uncanny ability to locate her in a crowded room. Like she was a beacon, his eyes found her quickly. He knew how close she was without looking.

After her accident, all those things intensified.

She had been working late, dedicated to finding where Damian Darhk, the man set on destroying their city. Remarkable as she was, Felicity had found a lead and led them right to his base of operations. Armed with her best tech, he and Digg had infiltrated the base and made it to the safe housing his plans for the city.

Except they hadn’t been there.

He still remembers how his whole world shifted with her piercing scream coming through the two way radio in his hood, the sound of violence that was too far away to prevent, that feeling of helplessness he never wants to feel again as he raced to her side on the back of the motorized bike she built him.

He remembers thick black smoke rising from the blackened husk of her former lab, visible from four blocks away, how it tore out his insides as his mind swarmed with a thousand possibilities all worse than the one before. He remembers racing into the burning building with flames licking at the edges of his suit and heat searing his skin to find her crumpled form.

The doctor he had raced her to brought her back from the brink of death and Oliver never left her side once. He was there when her heart failed, twice, and there when she woke for the first time and he cried. He witnessed her realization that she couldn’t feel her legs, and the ensuing panic.

And after all that, after she came to terms with her accident, he was by her side when she decided to do all she could to bring down the man who did this to her.

“Are you even listening to me?” Felicity demands his attention with a ‘harrumph’ and a glare.

Oliver smiles back innocently. “Of course. Don’t touch your stuff. Got it.”

She purses her lips and shakes her head. “I don’t know why I bother. We’re just going to have the same talk tomorrow. Don’t you have somewhere else to be? A party or something?”

Ah. Yes. The Lance’s ball. Not exactly his ideal place to be.

“I’m not leaving you here alone, Felicity.”

She rolls her eyes and maneuvers herself around the table. “You won’t be. Because I’m going too. Or have you forgotten? My mother is soon to be a Lance and I am required to at least be present for dinner.”

A box of parts nearly falls when she clips it while taking a turn to quickly, but Oliver rights it easily, following her through the maze of her lab.

“John’s picking me up in twenty minutes. There’s no reason for me to arrive before dinner considering I can’t exactly dance.”

There’s a note of regret in her voice that finds a home in Oliver’s chest and he resolves to find a way to change it.

“Nope. If you’re not leaving now, neither am I.”

She swings back to him, faster than he would have thought her chair capable of. “Oliver! You’re expected to be there! You can’t just shirk your duties. You know your mother wanted you to marry Laurel. _You_ admitted when we first met that you loved her. You need to be there for her on her birthday of all days!”

Where she had gotten the ridiculous idea that he was still in love with Laurel Lance is beyond him. Laurel had been in love with Tommy Merlyn. In fact, they had married three years ago in secret when Laurel discovered she was pregnant. Two weeks later, the city had been devastated by an earthquake that claimed the lives of 504 individuals, including Tommy and their unborn child. To this day the only people who knew were Oliver, Diggle, and Sara and Quentin Lance.

“I do love her, like a sister.” He kneels in front of her so they are closer to the same height and rests his hands on her knees. “And I will happily celebrate her birthday, but not without you.”

She purses her lips and surveys him, surely looking for his hidden purpose. He lets her look, knowing all she’ll find staring back at her is love.

“And if you want to dance, we’ll dance,” he announces.

“I can’t walk, Oliver, and I certainly can’t dance.”

“Then let me be your legs.” His offer has never been more sincere. Here in the lab she knows her value and never doubts herself. Here she’s comfortable. But around the rest of society, her wheelchair and the insecurities it exacerbates leave her drained and nervous. It’s the last thing he wants for her. She isn’t any less of an amazing woman because her legs were taken from her.

She blinks at him in surprise. “You hate dancing.”

He shrugs. “If it’s you asking...”

The words are heavy with meaning, because they both know what he’s really saying. After her accident, she wasn’t ready to hear it and Oliver didn’t want to push her with the newfound realization of his feelings.

“Oliver,” she whispers in a low warning tone.

He leans back with a sigh. “Felicity.”

It’s a conversation without words as she ultimately gives in and allows him to push her towards the exit. A mutual understanding that their relationship is shifting, but one they’re not ready to speak out loud.

“I still don’t see how you can dance with me,” she jabs at him as he transfers her into the steam-power carriage.

He grins back at her grease-covered face. “Well, then, I guess you’ll find out tonight.”

She shakes her head at his childish grin, but settles into his side as he navigates the streets back to her mother’s house where the lights are all on and her mother is no doubt in a frenzy over her lateness. Oliver walks beside her to the door, his pace matching hers.

“I’m not in love with her, you know that, right?”

Her hand pauses on the doorknob at his words and she looks back over her shoulder at him, a question in her eyes.

“I _am_ in love with a remarkable woman,” he continues, eyes boring into hers. “She’s brilliant and beautiful. Her smile lights up my whole world.” He takes a hand off the wheel of her chair and kisses the back of it with a teasing smile. “And I can’t wait to dance with her tonight, no matter what kind of spectacle it causes.”

Her lips part in surprise at the speech, drawing his attention to their bright color. They’re a tempting invitation. He’s so close it wouldn’t take much to close the distance and seal his lips to hers. Instead he turns her hand in his and presses a kiss to her wrist, eliciting a soft gasp.

Oliver steps deliberately away, never dropping eye contact as he backs up to his carriage. “See you tonight, Felicity.”

He smiles the entire way home.

 


End file.
